Things go boom

[Cain]

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[LMNO]

Ah, yes. The old "there are hundreds of unenforced laws on the books, lets find one" routine.

[Cain]

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[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Almost two weeks old, but still relevant:

Intelligence Report on Boston Marathon Bombing Delayed Indefinitely

Intelligence community watchdogs are extending their review of what the U.S. government knew beforehand about two brothers accused of carrying out the deadly April 15 Boston Marathon bombings, according to a government letter obtained by ABC News.

The joint letter from four inspectors general addressed to congressional committees that oversee national security, dated Friday, said their final report on what intel agencies knew about Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev before they allegedly used two bombs to kill three people and injure more than 260 others won't be finished this month, as anticipated.

To which I can only say, "hmmm".....

So they don't really want us to know what they knew.

[Cain]

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[Cain]

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[Cainad (dec.)]

 

[Cain]

More info on Tamerlan

http://www.bostonglobe.com/Page/Boston/2011-2020/WebGraphics/Metro/BostonGlobe.com/2013/12/15tsarnaev/tsarnaev.html

Tamerlan Tsarnaev first heard the voice when he was a young man.

It came to him at unexpected times, an internal rambling that he alone could hear. Alarmed, he confided to his mother that the voice "felt like two people inside of me."

As he got older, the voice became more authoritative, its bidding more insistent. Tamerlan confided in a close friend that the voice had begun to issue orders and to require him to perform certain acts, though he never told his friend specifically what those acts were.

"He was torn between those two people," said Donald Larking, 67, who attended the mosque with Tamerlan for nearly two years. "He said that several times. And he did not like it."

Federal investigators have suspected that Tamerlan, the 26-year-old boxer from southern Russia who is believed, along with his brother, to have set off the deadly Boston Marathon bombs in April, was motivated, if not deliberately directed, by real life jihadist revolutionaries on the other side of the globe. But an investigation by the Boston Globe suggests that Tamerlan was in the perilous grip of someone far more menacing: himself.

The Globe corroborated with several people who knew him just how plagued Tamerlan felt by the inner voices. Some family acquaintances feared for his mental health, among them a doctor concerned it could be schizophrenia.

Larking and Tamerlan, who met when Tamerlan visited his mother at work, took an immediate liking to one another and shared their views on conspiracy theory and American politics. Larking loaned his young friend copies of a newspaper he reads, "The Sovereign, newspaper of the Resistance!' ", which suggests that US military explosives were used in the World Trade Center attack. But Larking found that Tamerlan had strong political views of his own. He did not, for example, approve of President Obama's use of drones in foreign conflicts or what he considered the US government's expansive foreign policy.

"He felt the US should not get involved in other people's affairs and should stick to its own business," said Larking. "He did not like the country's involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq at all."

As their relationship grew closer, Tamerlan confided in Larking his troubling secret about the voice inside his head. Tamerlan told him that he had been hearing the voice for some time, and that he had a theory of what might be afflicting him.

"He believed in majestic mind control, which is a way of breaking down a person and creating an alternative personality with which they must coexist," explained Larking. "You can give a signal, a phrase or a gesture, and bring out the alternate personality and make them do things. Tamerlan thought someone might have done that to him."

The person inside him, as Tamerlan described it to Larking, "was someone who wanted to control him to make him do something."

Larking, too, found his young friend changed in several ways on his return. Much more serious than he had been, Tamerlan insisted that Larking grow a beard, "to honor the prophet Mohammed." Larking complied. He also pressed Larking to remove his wedding ring, saying that most Muslims did not wear gold, but Larking refused. The last time Larking and Tamerlan sat together in the rear of the mosque, Tamerlan once again mentioned the voices in his head. This time, as Larking recalled it, he seemed afraid.

"He said, 'Someone is in my brain, telling me stuff to do,' " recalled Larking. "He said he was trying to ignore it but it was hard to do. Whatever it was he was being told to do, he didn't want to do it."

Of course, it has to be remembered that Larking himself is probably not a reliable source, and he may be interpreting events through his own worldview, which is not exactly in sync with everyone else.  In fact, I find Larking somewhat suspicious...I'm well enough versed in conspiracy literature to know that the supposed mind-control program is "Monarch", whereas "Majestic" is from UFO lore.  Seems a rather odd error for Tamerlan or Larking to make, given their interests.

Though not related to the voices, this is interesting too:

So, too, Tamerlan's anger over America's foreign policy in Afghanistan and Iraq had escalated several notches. At home, he railed angrily about Muslims being killed overseas. When he talked on the phone to associates overseas, and even to friends and his brother in the apartment, he often spoke in Russian, far more than he ever had before. When Katie asked why, Tamerlan said the people he was talking to did not speak English.

[Suu]

Completely un-related: Harvard was evacuated because of a possible explosive this morning.

[Telarus]

Hrm, interesting stuff there....

[Cain]

The DoJ has confirmed it is seeking the death penalty for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.

It is likely this is an inducement to a plea bargain, but still...

[LMNO]

Hear about this last night.

So now we engage in the "vengance" debates, and only mention in passing that it costs three times as much to put a prisoner to death than life in prison does.

[Cain]

I prefer the vengeance debate, to be honest.  At least it makes sense.

Arguing over whether it's cheaper to let a man live or die as if it's a determining factor is worse, IMO.  It's trying to reduce justice to economics, which is about as big as a category error as possible.

[LMNO]

That's a good point.

And I've just fallen for the same line of thinking in that other thread about Utah, and justifying treating humans decently as an economic thing.

[Left]

If the voices in your head tell you to do crazy shit, you tell them to fuck off!

I mean, I know they sometimes scream at you for hours and all, but eventually they will shut up if you don't listen.